


reconstruction

by regionals



Category: Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Genderfluid Character, Other, Trans Female Character, Trans Male Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-23
Updated: 2017-06-23
Packaged: 2018-11-18 04:31:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11283798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regionals/pseuds/regionals
Summary: You’re not a hateful person, you really aren’t, but you’re, like, ninety percent sure you hate Brendon Urie. He’s just such a fucking douche bag and you can’t stand him. He’s egotistical, he’s loud, he’s annoying, he talks too much and runs his mouth, and his fucking nose pisses you off.





	reconstruction

**Author's Note:**

> ive been working on this for ages and honestly never tought id get around to finishing it but here u go  
> moral of the story: dont judge a book by its cover

You’re not a hateful person, you really aren’t, but you’re, like, ninety percent sure you hate Brendon Urie. He’s just such a fucking douche bag and you can’t stand him. He’s in your biology class and sits next to you. The only times he interacts with you is when there’s a lab or when he needs to copy answers, or on the rare occasion there’s a partner project.

You’re a pretentious hipster and you know it, and you figure that and the fact that he’s on the football team has to do with why you hate him. He’s egotistical, he’s loud, he’s _annoying,_ he talks too much and runs his mouth, and his fucking _nose_ pisses you off. It’s not a bad nose but it’s so obnoxious and _there_ and it _pisses you off._

The building tension between you and the barely older teenager comes to a head on a Wednesday. Okay, not necessarily a head, but you’re forced into another situation to where you’re going to have to spend more time with him than absolutely necessary and you’re just uncomfortable with it.

Your parents and his parents are friends, apparently, and while his parents are over at your house, you’re sent up to your room to hang out with him. (Read as be out of the way and out of mind since adults apparently need alone time even though they knew full-well that having sixteen year old sons required their constant attention.)

Brendon acts different this time. When it comes to doing school or anything school related, he’s loud and obnoxious and annoying and someone you dislike, but now that there’s nothing school related for the two of you to be talking about and for you to be getting annoyed at him over, he’s just quiet and not really paying attention to you or anything in the room besides his phone. The most he even said to you after entering your bedroom was, “Do you have an iPhone charger?” since his phone battery was hovering around seventeen percent.

You watch him curiously from behind your laptop from your place on your bed, just examining him, trying to learn about him. Despite apparently hating him, you do find him interesting. He looks different now than he does at school. His eyes are dull and almost lifeless, and the bags under his eyes are so much more noticeable. You have to wonder what the hell kind of stress the son of a doctor and a successful real estate agent can feel, if it’s even possible. He’s straight, too, which fucking gets you. Like, if he isn’t gay, then why does he look so stressed? You definitely _resent_ him.

His body language doesn’t ooze confidence right now either. Instead of suave confidence like usual, he just screams awkward and insecure and then he’s screaming annoyance when he’s saying, “Quit staring at me,” as he looks up from his phone with a pretty obvious frown on his face.

You turn red and your eyes flick back down to your laptop. You can hear him sigh, and a few more minutes of silence pass by before he asks, “Why don’t you like me? You always glare at me and Josh tells me some of the shit you’ve said about me. I just wanna know what I did, man.”

“How do you know Josh isn’t lying?”

“Because I’m not stupid and he’s too nice to lie to me. Just answer me. It’s been bugging me.” You hear the power button on his phone click, turning the screen off, and you decide to set your laptop aside so you can try to answer him without offending him too much.

“I think you’re a dick and I also think you’re annoying. You’re popular, people like you, except for me, you like popular things, and you’re just some societal drone, identical to all the rest.”

“You came up with that answer awfully fast,” Brendon says with a small sigh. He closes his eyes and presses a palm against his forehead, pulling his knees closer to his chest. “I’ve never even talked to you before,” is what he mumbles next.

You feel kind of bad, but you stick to what you said. “I know I did and I know you haven’t.”

“Why make all those assumptions about me if we’ve never had a proper conversation outside of school, then?”

“I don’t like popular things. I hate pop music, I hate pop culture, I hate celebrities, I hate all the popular kids at school, and anything mainstream. You fall under the popular kids at school category.”

“And you’re a pretentious and pious little hipster who needs to get over himself.”

“You’re not wrong.”

Brendon sighs for the millionth time, not necessarily at you, though, and changes the subject quickly by asking, “Do you have a blanket I could just, like… wrap myself in?”

“Not really, just my duvet. Which I’m using.”

“Can we share it? I’m… cold.” You feel like he’s lying as he says the last word, but you’re not so much of a dick as to deny someone the warmth and comfort a twelve dollar blanket from Walmart can provide.

You lift the corner of the duvet up, and pat the spot next to you. Your discomfort increases tenfold when the shorter boy is seated next to you with almost his entire body covered by the blanket, but you figure that it’s safe to just go back to scrolling through your feed on Tumblr, continuing to ignore his existence.

Brendon comes up to where you're sitting in the cafeteria the day after he was at your house. He looks vaguely upset, and you mentally scoff at him when he asks you if he could sit across from you. You don’t really have any friends, aside from a few people who have different lunch periods than you, and a few that you only know through the internet, meaning the table you’re at is empty, _meaning_ it’d be weird if you told him that, no, he couldn’t sit across from you.

He sets his own tray of food down before he sits, and you’re about to, y’know, ignore him, but he pipes up pretty quickly. “Can we try being friends or something? I don’t want you hating me for no reason.”

“Why do you care what I think?” Comes your snide response followed by a frown.

“I kind of think you’re cool and I’m a people pleaser. Also figured it’d make biology less awkward.”

“You have friends of your own, though.”

“They’re just people I hang out with. I don’t even talk to any of them outside of school, save for Josh,” _Narc,_ “and I definitely won’t care about any of them after I graduate. I don’t have any friends either. Don’t let the bad boy act fool you.”

“Bad boy? Really? You’re the most vanilla looking person I know.” You roll your eyes at him.

The two of you chat, and to you, things feel way too tense, but you still end up exchanging Skype names with him, promising to give him a chance.

You have a hard time talking to people regularly aside from an online friend you met a few years ago, meaning you end up at Brendon’s house for a weekend that you aren’t looking forward to at first. You’re expecting something other than what happens, honestly. Not that anything happens, though.

You find yourself being proved wrong within the first five minutes at his house. He’s a little quiet, seeming almost nervous, when he’s leading you to his bedroom so you can put your overnight bag away, and you can see _why._ The last time you’d gone to his house had been when either of you were freshmen, so, like, two years ago, and it’d been for a project in art class that you ended up doing on your own anyways. At that point, his room was normal. It was boring. There was football paraphernalia everywhere, and the whole place had a muted blue kind of color scheme.

This time it’s so… not that. It’s, like, the opposite of what someone like you would expect from someone like him, or at least from the person you apparently thought he was. There’s a bunch of cacti lining the window in his room, and there’s fairy lights strung above and around the window, not to mention lining the ceiling as well.

“Uh. Wow…”

“See? I can be all sophisticated and hipster-ish too,” He says, obviously nervously as he points to a place next to the vanity in his room. A vanity. He has a vanity in his room. You can see a spot on it where he tried, and failed, to peel the price label off, and given the quality of the baby blue paint on it, you figure it’s secondhand. It looks good, though, and it somehow fits.

“What happened to all of the, like, football stuff…?”

“I hate football, so I got rid of all of it. Except for the awards. My parents have those somewhere, probably in a box in the attic.”

“But you’re the quarterback and you have a varsity jacket.”

“Just because I hate it doesn’t mean I’m not good at it. I just want to fit in, man.” You watch his toes as they squeeze together subtly, and as he moves his foot, barely tugging on the black faux fur on the rug in his room.

That sleepover itself goes fairly well, honestly. You get along with him better than you ever thought you would, and you learn that, hey, Brendon Urie is actually a pretty alright guy. Still not your favorite person in the entire world, but he’s not too bad. He’s kind of weird, though. Well, not weird, you guess, but he spends a lot of time sitting up, wrapped in a blanket, and he wears a lot of over sized sweaters and sweatpants outside of school, which is so _weird._

Like, right now, for example. You’re sitting outside for lunch today, since it’s not too cold, watching him. He’s wearing blue jeans, a simple t-shirt, and his varsity jacket; he doesn’t look like the kind of guy who’d wear an off-white sweater and baggy gray sweatpants that did little to nothing to compliment his body. The fashionista inside of you really hates him for being so two sided.

Things come to another ‘head’ on a Saturday, probably a month or two after he’d gone to _your_ house that one time. You’d consider him a casual friend, and you don’t _hate_ him anymore, but you still don’t like him. Either way, you’re doing your thing—staying up all night, watching stupid shows on Netflix, since you’re that kind of guy, when you see your phone screen light up with a notification from Skype, saying, _‘space guy is calling you.’_

Brendon has himself named ‘space guy’ for whatever reason, and you quit questioning it pretty quickly. (He likes space, and you don’t care enough to tease him over it.) You answer the call, saying, “Dude, it’s like two in the morning.”

_“You don’t sound like you’re sleeping, so I’m not apologizing. Um. Are you gay…?”_

“No. I’m not straight either, though. Any reason for asking, other than to out me and ruin my life…?”

_“I don’t care if you aren’t straight. Well, I mean, I do, since everyone I know is straight, but, like… I’m having a situation. And I might or might not be outside of your house right now.”_

Okay, he made a liar out of you. You still hate him. You hang up on him, and you put on a pair of socks as to not make any noise on the hardwood while you walk to the front door. Sure enough, he’s standing there, stupid varsity jacket pulled tight around his small frame, and from what you can see from the street lamp in front of your house, he’s either freezing or upset. Or both.

You want to tell him to leave, but you don’t see his car, so you assume he walked, and since it’s cold, you really aren’t going to make him leave, at least until your parents get up and ask you why the hell he’s in your room. You motion for him to follow you through the house, after taking his shoes off. Hardwood is hard to sneak around on. You wish your house was carpeted.

“I had sex and it was gross and I felt like throwing up the whole time and I still do, even right now,” Is what Brendon mumbles out quickly once he’s made himself at home, your duvet wrapped around him.

“Uh. Was it consensual…?”

He rolls his eyes. “Of course it was. I was too embarrassed to stop, though, so I just… finished, then left. My girlfriend is going to be so mad at me tomorrow. I was supposed to spend the night.” He looks sad, and you want to hug him a bit. “Like, if this is what sex with girls is like, then, like… Am I gay? Do you know?”

“I can’t decide that for you, man, but, as someone who has done the deed with a few people, wanting to vomit isn’t normal. I’m such a guy, but honestly, so long as I got my dick in something tight and wet, I’m great. And also emotional connections and consent and all that jazz, but you get what I mean.”

“I mean, it _felt_ good, but I just… I dunno what’s wrong with me. I feel like scrubbing all my skin off or something.”

“Why are you here, man?”

“I think you’re the only person who doesn’t know me that well and who won’t make fun of me if I talk about this stuff?” He tries with a small shrug.

“Are you asexual or something…?”

“No. I love my girlfriend and I’ve had crushes on people. Lots of people.”

“That’s not what I asked. Sexual and romantic feelings are two wildly different things, bro.”

“What’s the difference?” He’s frowning, obviously not understanding, so you rack your insomniac mind, trying to find a way to explain.

“I’m horrible at explaining this stuff, but, like… For me and from what I hear, romantic feelings are like… When you _love_ someone. I mean, I looked at the girlfriend I had last year, and I was like, wow, alright, I love her. It’s like… affection, y’know? Do you feel that kind of thing?”

He nods. “Yeah, I feel that stuff.”

“Alright. Sexual feelings. Uh. The only way I’ve seen that described accurately that makes sense to me is… Do you ever look at someone and think, “I want to fuck you,” because, damn, they’re hot?”

“No, but I’m also sixt—”

“Who gives a shit about your age? If you feel a certain way, then you do. Sexuality is fluid. Point is, do you look at someone and want to fuck them? Yes or no?”

“No. I’ve honestly never looked at anyone and just _thought_ that.”

“Alright. C’mere,” You motion for Brendon to scoot towards you so you can show him an orientation chart. It’s not the most accurate one, but it’s simple, and not an information overload. “Do you read any of these then, like… You’re all like, “Oh, that’s me?” Because I do that with the pan section. Like, for me, at least, gender never really comes into the equation if I got a crush. I just like people.”

He nods, and takes your phone from you so he can read. He points at _asexual_ then _panromantic._ “Those two. What if I ever, like… have sex with anyone else though? Would that change everything?”

“You’re asexual, not celibate. Sex is fuckin’ great, dude. You don’t have to have it, but, like, you don’t have to abstain just because you feel like you aren’t valid or whatever.”

“How do you know about all this stuff?”

“I have a lot of queer friends and I’m queer too.”

He nods weakly and hands you your phone back, and you stiffen when he leans on you, head resting on your shoulder. “This feels like such a textbook way to find out about this stuff, but, like… everything makes sense now.”

“There’s a lot of other stuff that has to do with sexuality too, by the way, but, like… You gotta figure that out for yourself. I can totally give you resources, though, and you can talk to me about this stuff if ya want.”

“Y’know, Dallon, you’re an asshole, but, like… you’re also _not_ an asshole.”

You nudge him. “Shut up.”

Brendon has a problem. He’s a baby queer. You’re, like, an adolescent queer, and you’re pretty sure the alpha queer would probably be Tyler Joseph. That dude intimidates the shit out of you, and as a queer, you feel real inferior next to him. Point is, though, Brendon doesn’t get that you shouldn’t come out, like, two days after realizing that you’re insert sexuality here, and that’s why he’s dragging you to a secluded area, saying that his girlfriend threatened to break up with him and out him if he didn’t take it back.

He’s also got a problem of not putting his own well being before other people when he has to, which you figure out after he _doesn’t_ break up with his girlfriend when you tell him to. He’s inexperienced, and _she’s_ his first girlfriend, so you get where he’s coming from, but you tell him that, if he loves himself, he’s going to do what’s best and break up with her.

He just tells you off, though, all defensive and you just give him a sad little look. You don’t protest, though, because this is something he has to go through on his own, and it’s not your place to force him to do something he doesn’t want to do, because it’d just drive him away.

Not that you care.

You chat with him in Biology a bit and you wave to him in the cafeteria and sometimes you ask him how he’s doing on Skype over the course of yet another month, because for whatever reason, you’re worried about him. You are.

You figured he was just mad at you for suggesting he break up with his girlfriend, but like every fanfic for whichever TV show you’re obsessing over at any given moment that you've read, things pan out so predictably that it, literally, kills you. (Okay, definitely not literally, since you’re alive to tell this, but on the inside you were totally rotting.)

Your parents like him, so of course when he knocks, they let him in and tell him to go up to your room, thoroughly surprising you, since neither of you had any plans to hang out that day. He knocks once before coming in, and you're half expecting your mom, but, nope, it's not her. Obviously.

Brendon doesn't say anything to you as he seats himself on the floor in front of your closet while he proceeds to remove his shoes, pants, jacket, and shirt, in that order.

You ask him what the hell he's doing, and he shushes you as he stands up, looking into your closet, and rifling through your clothes. He pulls out a t-shirt that's big, even on you, meaning his small ass is going to drown in it. You figure that, one day, he might grow, but, right now, he's ridiculously small. Though, you're already pushing six feet, and you're the same age as him.

You're right about the shirt; it looks like someone draped a bed sheet on him, and you're glad he has underwear on, since the damn thing stretches down to the middle of his thighs. After he's on your bed, wrapped into a burrito with your duvet, you raise your voice and slowly ask, "Why... Are... You... _Here_?"

"Got my car taken away and your house was closest and also your parents like me."

"You live like two miles away!"

"Took me an hour to get here. I ain't leavin'."

You sigh in defeat and roll your desk chair across the floor in the room until you're next to your bed. "You didn't really answer me. Why are you here?"

"Reasons. Things. Stuff. Y'know." You see him shrug, and you can hear that his voice is a little strained.

"Did something happen...? If something happened you can tell me."

He shrugs again, and the duvet opens up for a minute so he can pat the place next to him on the bed, causing you to crawl across it to sit next to him. You let him somehow manage to manhandle _you_ into a position that's comfortable for him to curl up into your side while also being able to talk to you without raising his voice above anything much more than a whisper.

"The past month has been really shitty. Y'know how I told my girlfriend how I thought I was asexual?"

You nod and, without really thinking, you hug him as best as you can without disrupting the position the two of you were already in.

"She said she could fix me."

"You don't need fixing, though...?"

"Gee, you're observant, and water is wet," Brendon basically snaps back at you, causing you to wince slightly. "She's been basically forcing me to have sex with her, then got mad at _me_ when I said things hadn't changed."

You freeze in your spot. Which isn't saying much, of course, considering you hadn't really been moving in the first place, but still; you tense up. "That's, like... not good. Have you, uh... told anyone else?"

"She's too small for anyone to believe me, man," He says weakly. You're livid right now, and you sorta wish he would've taken your advice to break up with her. "I already broke up with her anyways. She tried getting me to do it again and I was already having a bad day and I didn't need to feel even more disgusting so I told her we were, like, done."

"You were done when she threatened to out you to everyone, dude. Why come to me, though? You have other friends who aren't me. Other friends who probably know better ways to help."

"I told you that my friends are the football team. They're all mean and sex crazy. We're supposed to want _it_ more than anything or whatever. I'd tell, like, Josh or whatever, but he'd tell his boyfriend, and his boyfriend loves to gossip, so then everyone would know. Also, like I said, your house is closest. And you don't have friends to gossip with or whatever."

"This isn't the kind of thing you'd gossip about. I mean, I'd gossip about you flagging mid-way because that'd be hella awkward, but not about _this."_

"Flagging?"

"It's like when you lose your boner while doing it. Which is a thing. Unfortunately."

"Oh. Can we, just, like... hang out...? And not talk about this...? I just had to tell someone, and now I have, so I just wanna pretend like I don't hate myself and, like... yeah."

Brendon goes home in the morning, in his own clothes, and a few days later you start to wonder if he has some weird fetish, or, well, not fetish, but some sort of _thing_ for wearing your clothes, because during passing, he walks up to you and where you're standing, pulling books out of your locker, and asks, "Do you have a shirt or something I could borrow?"

You look down at him. "What's wrong with yours?"

"It's too tight and... I dunno."

"I feel like you _do_ know," You comment.

"I feel like I'm suffocating in a way," he answers, finally, voice hushed.

You sigh and hand your notebook, pencil bag, and geometry textbook to him so you can look at the two shirts and sweatshirt you keep in your locker in case of an emergency. You end up handing him the sweatshirt, which isn't an interesting one, honestly. It's big, it's gray, and it's warm--that's why it's in your locker. It's practical. "Does this work?"

"Yeah, man, it does. Uh. I'll--I'll trade you my shirt and jacket as, like, collateral or whatever. Is that cool?"

You nod, and you snort softly at how he just peels his shirt off in the middle of the hallway before putting your sweatshirt on. You take his shirt and his jacket from him when they're handed to you, and place them neatly at the bottom of your locker with the other two shirts.

On top of being intimidating as shit, what with being the alpha queer, Tyler Joseph is also the most insufferable person you've met. Actually, that's not true, since Brendon tends to be the most insufferable, but you still find yourself groaning internally when the aforementioned alpha queer plops down next to you after he gets onto the bus, saying, "Damn, Daddy Dallon, you're looking _fine,"_ with a smirk and a slightly predatory look thrown your way.

"Thank you, son," You reply, bleakly.

"Yeah, whatever--what's going on with you and Urie?"

"We're _friends."_

"Really? Two months ago you hated him, now he's wearing your shirts and sweatshirts."

"So? It's none of your business."

Tyler scoffs and rolls his eyes. "It is when my boyfriend's best friend is apparently my best friend's boyfriend."

"He's not my _boyfriend,_ you asshole. I said _friends._ I don't even like him like that anyways. Also, since when am I your best friend?"

"Since I want information out of you. And also since you gave me forty dollars to buy a chest binder with." Tyler smiles at you awkwardly and gives you two thumbs up.

"I don't have any information, little dude."

He continues badgering you, and when Josh's stop comes up, the other teen finds himself being, literally, yanked roughly into the seat you're sharing with Tyler, which makes it an even tighter fit. "Josh, they are insisting that there's nothing going on with Urie."

You roll your eyes hard enough to give you a headache.

"Brendon says there isn't anything going on either, babe. It's between the two of them."

 _"Thank you,_ Josh. Keep your man under control."

Brendon's at your house almost constantly for whatever reason, and you've learned to quit questioning it when he starts getting off at your bus stop with you and following you home. Your parents have also learned to quit questioning it too.

He borrows your clothes (or shirts, rather, since your pants are far too big), only returning them whenever he finds clothes of his own to wear at his own house, or whenever he changes at yours.

Brendon's super affectionate. Not all of the time, but when he is, you turn into a blushing mess and you wish he didn't make you feel like that. When he's at your house, the two of you tend to watch weird TV shows on the TV in your room, and once in a while he reaches over and holds your hand. The first time he does it, it's not on purpose, and you ask him about it. "Why are you holding my hand?"

He yanks his hand away and apologizes. "I'm so sorry. Sometimes I just... sometimes it's nice to have a little contact with someone. I'm so sorry--it was just a reflex."

You feel a little bad for him, so you reach over again and grab his hand. "That's fine. I understand that."

Brendon invites you over to his house and tells you to bring Tyler with you. You're not sure why Tyler is necessary, but you don't question him.

"Why do you think Brendon wants both of us there?" Tyler's asking the second you're at his house to pick him up. (You got your license recently.)

"No idea," you reply. It's the truth. You have no clue why he wants _both_ of you there.

Brendon's wearing an oversized _pink_ sweater and a pair of white leggings when you and Tyler show up at his house. Tyler's eyebrows are raised so high up that they could be in orbit as soon as he gets a look at the short boy.

Once sitting in Brendon's room, you in your usual place in the corner of the bed, and Tyler sitting in the chair in front of the vanity, Brendon nervously starts talking. "Tyler, I was looking at your Instagram and I saw you were really, _really_ good with make up and I was sort of wondering if you'd like... do mine...?"

Brendon looks so embarrassed and insecure and you wish your first reflex wasn't to walk over and to hug him. (You don't hug him, but you want to.)

Tyler looks surprised but Tyler's also really nice, and just says, "Yeah, I'd be down for that. What sort of look were you wanting to go for...?"

Brendon pulls up a few pictures on his phone, and both you and Tyler crowd around him to look. The first one is someone with burgundy lipstick on and with, like... a smokey eye. You're not cis but it doesn't mean you know what makeup looks are called. He also shows Tyler a bunch of different eyebrows and Tyler stops him eventually, saying, "I think I know what you want, man. Do you happen to have any makeup?"

Brendon rolls his desk chair over to the vanity, and opens the biggest drawer. Inside, it's filled with makeup, and your eyes go wide, because, holy shit. "Whenever I have money I usually go to the mall and buy make up at those make up stores. It's kinda... stupid. I guess. I dunno. I practice but I'm still not good and I just wanted to know what I'd look like if I _was_ good." He's rambling on a little too much and Tyler hushes him.

"It's okay, Brendon." Tyler looks through the drawer and pulls out a bunch of stuff. "Why do you want to wear make up?"

"I like how it makes me look and feel, I guess."

Tyler nods and doesn't say anything else as he picks up a tube of orange lipstick.

"I said burgundy--"

"You have stubble," Tyler says with a roll of his eyes.

It takes a good hour before Tyler's finished. Brendon doesn't look in the mirror first, instead turning to look at you to ask, "How do I look?"

If you're honest, he looks great. "You look great." He looks really pretty and beautiful too, but you don't actually say that.

Tyler tells him he looks fucking fabulous.

Brendon turns around in his desk chair and you swear he spends an eon just staring at himself.

"So? Did I do a good job? Is that what you wanted?"

And then he starts tearing up.

You've mostly been sitting out of the way, since you don't have too much to contribute, but when you see the first tear fall you're sliding off of the bed and walking over to where he and Tyler are at. "Hey, what's wrong, man? You look really great." You rub his back a little bit.

He just shakes his head and presses his palms to his eyes. You and Tyler kind of just sit there, not sure on what to do after he grabs the pack of make up wipes he'd bought at some point, and leaves the room, saying he's going to shower.

Tyler speaks first. "Ten bucks says he's trans."

You nudge Tyler. "Invasive much?"

"I'm just saying. I had a panic attack when I realized I was trans, and I was crying when I put on my chest binder for the first time, _plus_ I cried when I cut all my hair off. I seriously wouldn't be surprised if he's trans. Like, instead of him crying at cutting all his hair off, it's him crying because he looks pretty." Tyler's keeping his voice down, and he just looks so concerned that it's... sorta weird. The way he's phrasing his words, he sounds like he's taking all of this lightly, but he's not. Tyler's a good person and you admire him.

 

You take Tyler home before his curfew, and then you're back over at Brendon's house again. When you'd left, he'd been looking at something on his phone, but when you get back, he's under three blankets, and curled into a ball. You can see the top of his hair poking out, and you pull on it a little bit. Not enough to hurt, but enough to get his attention. He looks at you and his eyes are all red and bloodshot and wet and his face is splotchy and sticky looking and your heart breaks a little bit. "Hey, man, what's wrong?" You frown a little bit and you let him grab your hand and tug you into the bed next to him.

It's a little hot (a lot hot) under three blankets with another person, but he's, like, super upset for some reason, so you don't complain or say anything. You just let him... do whatever. "Brendon, buddy, what's wrong?"

He blubbers out, "I don't _know!"_  and his small hands are gripping your t-shirt.

"Okay, okay, that's alright." You're speaking in that one voice everyone uses when they're trying not to upset someone. You don't know if it's helping, but you're trying not to startle him or something. Brendon's really delicate and sensitive, you've noticed. He has you pushed onto your back, and you're petting his hair. He doesn't really like to be touched on his back, or you'd probably be rubbing his back.

 

Summer break happens and the first day of vacation, Brendon's at your house, like, really early, waking you up. Your parents are always up super early, and he knows this, so he was able to get away with showing up. You almost sock him in the jaw when he shakes you awake, mostly just from being startled.

“Why are you here so early?” You whine as you close your eyes again and frown, pulling your duvet around yourself.

Brendon doesn’t say anything, but you hear him moving around, and the next thing you know he’s lying in front of you and you’re spooning him. You can feel the bare skin of his legs against yours, so you figure he, like, took his pants off. “This is kind of gay, bro,” you mumble quietly.

He elbows you. “Can I talk to you?”

You sigh silently. You _just_ woke up. Why is he like this? “You have my attention, so go for it, I suppose.”

“My mom wants to go to Hawaii for vacation, since most of her family lives there, but she wanted me to get a haircut before we went, and, like… I _really_ don’t want a haircut. I don’t know why. Like, I got all… sick to my stomach when she said that, so I walked here. Do you know what that means?”

“That you really like your hair and that your mom shouldn’t be telling you how to wear it,” comes your quiet, dry response. You’re still spooning him, and you’re sort of letting yourself get comfortable.

“It’s _different_ than that. If it was just that, I would’ve just told her _‘no.’_ I always say no when I don’t want to do something, but I couldn’t do that this time, and I don’t know why. You always know about stuff like this and I trust you, so I don’t know…”

“Why do you like your hair long?” _If Tyler was right, I’m going to be real fuckin’ impressed with him._

“It’s stupid,” he mumbles.

“I can guarantee that it’s probably not stupid, Brendon.”

“I like that I look… I dunno… pretty.” His hair isn’t, like that long right now. It’s a little below his ears and if he straightened it, his bangs would probably hit the bottom of his nose. “I mean, I’m not Kylie Jenner or anything, or--or a girl,” _Tyler’s really smart, holy shit,_ “but I just… I don’t look all masculine and _butch.”_

“It’d be cool with me if you were a girl,” you’re, y’know, mumbling. You’re too tired to use your speaking voice. “I mean, I’m not a boy.” He knows you’re queer, but you never told him that you weren’t, like, cis. “I’m not a girl either, though.” You don’t label yourself, honestly. You usually just say that you’re genderfluid and leave it at that since that’s what comes closest to how you feel.

“You can’t be neither. You have to be one or the other.” Brendon sounds confused and not malicious. You’ve learned what his tones mean, and this is his ‘I’m confused and I need you to explain to me’ tone.

“Yeah I can. Imagine one of those block toys where you have to push the blocks through holes. ‘Male’ is a star shaped block, ‘female’ is a circle shaped block, and I’m a triangle shaped block. I don’t fit into either of those holes, unless male was, like, The Star of David or something.” You’re waking up a little more and you’re speaking more steady.

“How would I know if I wasn’t, like… a boy?”

“Think of ‘male’ and what it means to you, and whether or not you identify with it. You can do the same with ‘female.’ Think of what being a girl means to you, and whether or not you identify with it. That what I did when I was starting to figure this stuff out for myself.”

Brendon goes silent and you figure he’s thinking about it. You rub your thumb across his, since you have one of your hands over one of his. A lot of your, like, _moments_ with Brendon happen in a bed, which you do find odd, but you don’t question it.

Eventually he says, “Do I have to do it today?”

“Of course not, buddy. You don’t have to do shit if you don’t want to. I mean, personally, I’d recommend thinking about it at some point, but do it at your own pace. Whatever happens, though, I promise I’ll still be your friend and accept you unconditionally, alright?”

 

Brendon never gets that hair cut, and you’re happy for him. He really likes his hair, alright? You’re glad his mom didn’t make him cut it off. He’s in Hawaii from the middle of June to the end of July and the week before he comes home he comes out to you via a very long and heartfelt note that he ended up having to send to you via email instead of Skype, since mobile Skype is stupid and likes to cut off messages.

(You sort of want to smack him upside the head after reading how he greets you in the first line of his note.)

 

_Dear Daddy Dallon,_

_Okay, I know you already, like, love me unconditionally and all that jazz (platonically) but does that stop me from being scared from telling you about this? Nope, it does not stop me in the slightest._

_You’re, like, super duper important to me, and I don’t know if it’s weird, but I consider you my best friend because you’re really nice to me, you listen to me, you help me with my problems a lot, and I trust you so much. I haven’t had a friend like that before, so that’s like, really important to me--having something like that in my life._

_This sounds like a textbook, but when I was little, I always had this unsettling feeling really deep in my gut, and I felt like I wasn’t who I was supposed to be. The feeling went by mostly unnoticed until I was fourteen or so, which is around the time I met you for the first time, and around the time I started getting rid of all of my football stuff._

_Getting rid of my football stuff kind of symbolized something to me, in a way. I mean, if you look at me, it’s obvious I compensate for_ something, _and football was that thing I used. Getting rid of that brought that weird feeling back to light, and needless to say, I wasn’t particularly pleased with it._

_I don’t know what my sexuality is, because I don’t necessarily think I’m asexual, but I also don’t know that I’m not, because I can’t tell that if the reason I don’t want to have sex with people is because I hate myself and my body so much, or if it’s something else._

_Anyways, though, I thought that I would be completely satisfied and happy with myself once I had a label for my sexuality/romantic orientation but no, I can’t have nice things. That was not the case. The thing with the girlfriend happened, for one thing, and then the thing where Tyler did my make up and I had three panic attacks the same night happened._

_When you asked me what was wrong that night, I said, “I don’t know,” because at the time I really didn’t but a few weeks after that I realized that I was freaking out because I don’t want to be like this. I_ want _to be comfortable in my own body, I_ want _to love myself, I_ want _to be normal, but I’m not._

 _I don’t like that I have a strong jawline, I don’t like my stubble, I don’t like my shoulders and how they’re all broad and gross, I don’t like the way there’s_ muscle _everywhere on my body, I don’t like my tiny hips, I don’t like all my stupid body hair, I don’t like my stupid voice because it’s so deep. I wish I was, like, the opposite of all of that, you know? I want a nice, dainty face, I want to practically be bald everywhere except for my head, I want slender and meek shoulders, I want a feminine and curvy body, and I want one of those divine and gracious and feminine voices._

_I want to cut this off before I write you a five hundred page novel, but, to answer your question, I’m, like, 99.9% sure that I am a girl. I don’t have another name, and I haven’t found one that I like yet, but maybe referring to me as a girl would be super great and I would love you forever if you did that._

_-your buddy._

_(PS: You can still call me Brendon. Also, like, pretend like this isn’t a thing in front of my parents and basically everyone else until either more people know or unless I say something.)_

_(PPS: Also, I work at a really fast pace so sorry if this all seems out of nowhere. Thanks?)_

 

You end up reading the email four or five more times before you send a response to her.

 

_Dear Little Lady Who Needs to Stop Calling Me Daddy,_

_You’re my best friend too. It’s cool that you’re a girl. It just means my life is no longer a sausage fest. (Tyler, Josh, Spencer, etc… So much sausage.)_

_On a serious note, you’re also super important to me, and I am 100% on your side and I am 100% here for you and I 100% support you, enthusiastically and unconditionally._

_-dal_

 

Brendon shows up at your house almost the second she’s back from Hawaii. Okay, more like the day after, but still. You’re on your back on the floor in your bedroom, looking through a thread on Twitter about drama between a few big accounts in a fandom you’re sort of but not really in, when she’s busting into your room, and groaning loudly before pulling the usual routine of stealing one of your shirts.

“Why are you on the floor?” You’re being asked once Brendon’s finished putting on one of your shirts.

“Reading something,” you mumble quietly.

“What are you reading?” Brendon’s now next to you on the floor, wedging herself between your arm and your side so she can have a good view of your phone.

“Two big accounts got into a fight and someone posted a thread dragging both of them on Twitter,” you reply easily.

“What was the fight about?”

“This one musician got his hair dyed a weird color and people read into it too much and it just… is a mess. I seriously don’t know how to explain it. Both of them are fifteen, mind you.”

“Dude, you’re barely seventeen.”

“I stand by my statement.”

“I told Tyler about the thing,” Brendon’s mumbling quietly.

“Yeah? What’d he say?” You turn your phone screen off to look Brendon in the eye.

“He said that, uh… If I wanted he’d be willing to part with some of his old clothes, since we’re about the same size. I probably won’t ever get a chance to wear them, but… I dunno.”

“Take him up on the offer if you want. It’s not like _he’s_ going to wear them.”

 

“How do you even know how to do this?” Brendon’s asking as she watches Tyler, who is doing her nails.

“I’m eighteen, right?” Tyler looks to you.

You think for a moment. “I think? You graduated last year, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Then yeah.”

“Don’t smoke weed, Brendon. Shit fucks you up.” You snort. Too late for that. “Anyways, I’ve got _plenty of time_ pretending to be a girl under my belt, and it’s not like my family has tons of money, so I always did my own nails.”

Tyler’s doing this, like, matte black color that fades into a glittery gold kind of color, and it looks so cool. You’re pretty sure it’s called an ombre. “What if my parents make me take the nails off?”

“Then they do, but you’ll at least have a few hours to enjoy them.” Tyler smiles sweetly and Brendon bites her lip and nods.

It takes, like, ten years for them to finish the nails, at least to you, but when Brendon’s showing them off, you’re saying, “Bren, you’re gonna make some lucky fucker a _great_ wife one day,” which draws a giggle from her. “Those are fucking awesome.”

Tyler raises his eyebrows and speaks up. “The two of you _still_ aren’t together?”

Either of you say, _“No,”_ way too quickly, and in unison, and _way_ too defensively.

Brendon says, “I don’t like him--them, sorry--like that.”

You say, “Ditto.” You’re lying, but you don’t know if Brendon is. You’re not sure when you developed your little crush, but you _did,_ and you hate it. You don’t know how you went from hating every fibre of her being to probably being in love with her. Okay, not, like, _in love,_ but you genuinely do like her.

Tyler, at least, knows that _you’re_ lying, if the look on his face has anything to say.

 

Brendon gets a night home alone, so you get invited over, of course. As soon as you’re in her house, there’s a fucking _leg_ waxing kit being stuffed into your hands, only with the explanation of, “I’m too much of a wuss to do it myself.”

“You invited me over to wax your legs?”

“Well, yeah. We’re best friends and part of being best friends is getting up close and personal with each other’s legs without it being weird.”

You roll your eyes and you trail her up the stairs and into the bathroom. She peels her basketball shorts off, and sits on the counter, legs crossed, hands folded neatly in her lap. Brendon’s legs aren’t, like, _that_ hairy, but they aren’t bald either.

You read the directions on the box of the leg waxing kit a few times, and just before you’re about to pull one of the waxing strips from her legs, she grabs your wrist, and you spiritually sigh. “Dude, I can’t wax your legs if you won’t let me.”

“I’m scared. It’s gonna hurt.”

“I mean, I am about to be ripping hair out of your leg with wax strips…? It’s not supposed to feel good, unless you’re, like… into that.”

You go back and forth with her for a while before you get an idea. It’s probably a bit of a dick move, but you lean forward, and crash your lips against Brendon’s, and while she’s still trying to process what you’d just done, you rip the wax strip off.

“Dallon, you fucker! That wasn’t fair!”

“You spent five minutes arguing with me! At least we have, like, at least a twentieth of your leg waxed now.”

Brendon takes a minute to mentally prepare herself before you rip another wax strip off, and it gets easier and quicker from there on out.

Eventually you ask, “Why do you want your legs waxed?”

“Dysphoria. They’ve been bugging me lately and I just want to see if waxing them will help.”

You nod. You get that. “Is it helping?” You’re starting on her other leg now.

“A little bit, I think. We’ll see, I guess.” Brendon yelps quietly as you’re ripping off another wax strip, and like you have every other time you’ve ripped one off, you sooth one of your hands over the area. You have no idea if it’s helping, but you feel bad. “Hey, you deal with the dysphoria thing--how do you have sex?”

“Put my dick in and move,” you mumble as you’re smoothing another wax strip down.

Brendon gets you in the side with her leg. “I want a real answer, you smart ass.”

“It just depends on how I feel, I guess—” _rip,_ “--because sometimes I want to curl up into a ball and die, but other times I’m totally ready to get it _on._ I just try to rationalize things, because I can’t suddenly change my body. My only problem is that I’m _fluid,_ and some days I feel more feminine than I do masculine, but other days I’m, like, the manliest man to ever man, then there’s days I’m just… in between, I guess.

“A lot of people like to think of sex as this _physical_ thing, and--and there’s different kinds of sex, too. Penetrative sex isn’t the only kind of sex there is. I haven’t exactly gotten around or anything, because I’ve only had a few girlfriends and a boyfriend before, but for me, at least, sex is kind of just… emotional. I’m not saying it’s bad to fuck around and have a lot of sex, but, for me, personally, if I were to be slutting it up all the time, it’d definitely chip away at my self esteem over time. Sex is personal and intimate and it’s not required. Like, if you don’t want to have sex, then don’t. It’s not some rite of passage or some bullshit like that.”

“I think I might not have liked sex because I was doing it with a girl.”

“Elaborate…?”

“Like, okay--um… How do I explain…” She bites one of her lips for a second before speaking, slowly and carefully. “It’s like… I think it was sleeping with a cis person that put me off…? And someone who didn’t _know_ what was going on with me. It was like… Having sex is a thing that the _guys_ do, and… yeah. Do you know what I’m saying?”

You nod, because you do know. “Being treated like a guy? Was that it?”

“Basically, yeah.”

“And you think that if you had sex again, and you were treated like you were a cis girl, then it’d be better?” You quirk an eyebrow up at her.

“Probably. I’d also need someone who’d have to get that if I said stop, or no, then, like, they’d have to _do that.”_

“I hope you find someone like that,” you say. It’s the safe thing to say, even if you really want to say, _“I’d treat you like a princess.”_ That sounds a little too fuckboyish for your tastes, though.

“Me too,” she mumbles. At this point, you’ve _just_ barely peeled the last wax strip from her leg, and you take a minute to admire your handiwork. You did a pretty good job. Brendon’s legs are so _red,_ though.

“Do you got any lotion or something to put on your legs…?”

Brendon nods and you watch her lean to her left to get a jar of coconut oil from a drawer. “I use this on my face, usually.”

You take the jar, and, okay, rubbing coconut oil on your best friend’s legs that you just waxed isn’t as weird as you thought it’d be.

 

“I asked my mom what she would’ve named me if I was a girl, and she said either Malia or Kiana.”

“Yeah?” You look up from your phone and at Brendon.

“Yeah. They’re Hawaiian names. Which one of them sounds better…? I’m, uh, y’know… thinking about using one of them.”

“One of Obama’s daughters is named Malia, so that one is out of the question. Kiana is nice, though. Does it mean anything?”

“It’s the Hawaiian version of Diana apparently. I talked to Tyler, and he dared me to call myself Brenda. Like, no thanks. I would _kill_ myself if I went by _Brenda.”_

You cackle. “Yeah. I’d still talk to you, but you are just… _not_ a Brenda.”

“You’re not wrong. I’ll get back to you when I decide.”

 

You go with Brendon and Tyler when they go _shopping._ Brendon wants to buy at least _one_ outfit that doesn’t consist of Adidas and Wranglers, and you don’t blame her. You’re the kind of person who spent thirty dollars buying fake _boobs_ on freaking _Amazon,_ just because Brendon asked you to, and Tyler’s the kind of person who’s going to spend what little money he already has, plus Brendon’s money, on an outfit that would work for her.

It’s September at this point, and Brendon’s sort of been having a not so great time lately. She’s not on the football team anymore, and told you that she couldn’t deal with being in the locker rooms, which you understand. She’s also been getting bullied, basically, for hanging out with you and Josh. Tyler’s graduated, or you’re sure he’d be there to break a few noses for Brendon.

On top of that, Brendon, _at the least,_ looks _really_ flamboyant. Her hair is more grown out, almost past her shoulders now, and she gets her nails done once a month. Brendon’s parents are cool with the hair and the nails thing--they think she’s going through a phase, and they were (and still are) cool when Brendon started casually wearing light make up, but, of course, not everyone can be accepting, especially teenagers in a school in fucking Las Vegas.

Today, the shopping day, is a _Brendon_ day. You don’t have much feedback to give, but you’re still being dragged into dressing rooms with her. You always turn around, keeping your eyes focused firmly on the wall, only turning again whenever Brendon tugs on your sleeve.

This time, she’s wearing an outfit that looks… well, it looks amazing. The outfit is simple--just a black, long sleeved cocktail dress, tights, and a pair of black wedges. The price tag on the shoes read sixty dollars, and you know Brendon’s going to end up putting them back, but they’re in her size and you saw the _look_ on her face, so you have a feeling in the back of your head that you’re going to crack and end up buying them. (It’s not like you have tons of money, but your parents are wealthy, and you get a one thousand dollar spending limit per quarter.)

“How do I look?”

Okay, you’d be lying if you said your heart wasn’t hammering in your chest right now. Your pulse in your ears is about all you can hear right now and you really can’t stop yourself from saying, “Beautiful. You look like a princess.”

“I look weird,” Brendon mumbles, face red but downcast, as she’s looking in the mirror.

“No you don’t.” Your response is immediate.

“I do. I mean… Look.” Brendon places her hands flat on her chest. “There’s nothing there. It looks weird because I’m flat chested and have small hips.”

“That’s why I bought the things, to help with the chest problem.”

Despite Brendon’s self consciousness, that ends up being the outfit that is bought.

 

Brendon’s parents are at _your_ house, thankfully, which means you, Tyler, and Brendon get Brendon’s house all to yourselves. Tyler does her make up, and you flush red when you’re the one zipping the dress up, as per Brendon’s request. You are drowning in romantic feelings for this girl. Tyler’s also nice enough to take a hair straightener to Brendon’s hair, and he styles it, making Brendon _actually_ look like a princess now.

“Dallon, where’d you buy the fake boobs? They look so fucking _real.”_ Tyler’s eyes are wide, and he’s touching Brendon’s chest, almost nonstop. If the boobs were real, it’d probably be bordering on sexual harassment.

“Amazon,” you answer. “They cost me a pretty penny.”

“Do they at least look good on me?”

“God, yeah. All we need to do now is figure out a way to pad your hips.”

“What do you think?” You’re getting a shy look from her and it makes you melt.

“I think you look beautiful.”

 

You and Brendon skip out on homecoming. Brendon doesn’t go, because if she did, she’d end up in a suit, and you didn’t go because, like, school dances are super boring without your best friend, y’know?

It still ends up being one of the most romantic nights of your life so far, though.

You help Brendon get dressed into the outfit she’d bought a few months prior, the one with the cocktail dress. You’re already in a blazer and slacks, and, if you’re honest, the two of you are, like, a power couple, even though you’re not _with_ her.

The lights in Brendon’s room get turned off, and the only light there actually is comes from the fairy lights in the room. It’s dim, and Brendon’s face is illuminated in shades of blue and purple and she’s so fucking beautiful that it makes your heart hurt.

“Have you ever slow danced before?”

“I had a girlfriend for six months, Dal. Of course I have.”

You roll your eyes and get a song ready to play on your phone. “I mean, have you ever slow danced and _not_ been the one who was leading?”

“Nope.”

“Well,” you press play on the song, smirking when Brendon visibly blushes as _Take My Breath Away_ starts playing from the speakers that are on her desk. “Would you _please_ do me the honors of dancing with me, Miss Urie?”

“You’re a dork,” she’s mumbling as she takes your hand. It’s a little awkward, since either of you are used to leading when it comes to slow dancing, but you get the hang of it. Her forehead is on your shoulder, your hands are on her waist, and her arms are thrown over your shoulders. “I really like you, Dallon.”

“I like you too.”

“I mean that I _like_ you.”

“Like I said; I _like_ you too.” Okay, this can’t be happening. This is unreal. Brendon is _so far_ out of your league. “I think you’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”

“You must not have seen very many girls,” she mumbles.

“I’ve seen plenty of girls, and you are, by far, the prettiest. I chose this song for a reason, y’know.”

“Ask me to be your girlfriend, Dallon.”

You huff out a quick breath, and you grin a little stupidly. “Would you, perhaps, like to be my girlfriend…?”

Brendon’s arms fall from where they were thrown over your shoulders, and instead wind up wrapping around your torso, and she’s nodding slightly into your shoulder, hugging you tight. “I’d love that.”

 

Brendon accidentally outs herself to her parents sometime around Christmas, a month after homecoming. You’re not there for it, mostly since you were in Sparks for a band competition, but you get a phone call while you’re on the bus back home.

_“Can you talk?”_

“I’m on the bus.” That should be an answer.

_“Can I talk and can you listen, and answer so long as I, like, make it possible for you to answer vaguely?”_

“Yeah, of course you can.” You frown, and pick at a hole in the back of the seat that’s in front of you. Spencer’s sitting next to you, and quirking an eyebrow at you, and you put a finger to your lips, hoping he gets the hint to butt out. (It’s not as if Spencer’s all up in your business all the time like a certain _someone_ (Tyler) is, but he does get curious.)

_“I accidentally outed myself.”_

She doesn’t sound _upset._ “Good or bad?”

_“Um… good. Way better than I expected. I thought they were going to disown me or something. Dad didn’t look too happy, but Mom said she’d call my doctor tomorrow and look into getting a referral to someone who, uh, specializes in this stuff… This is weird.”_

“That’s really good, babe.” You’re grinning. You’re thrilled about this.

 _“I know. I, uh… I dunno. I don’t even know what to_ think. _I mean--I’m gonna get to be a real girl, probably.”_

“You already are.”

_“I know, but… you know. Can I come over when you get home? I need to hug you, and to possibly cuddle while we watch a shitty TV show.”_

“I think that could be arranged, yes.”

_“I love you.”_

That’s the first time she’s said that to you, and given the way she’s hanging up right after, you figure it was a slip.

 

 **Dallon:** u cant just DROP that on me then hang up like at least give me a few seconds to say “i love you too, brendon”

 **Bumble Bee:** suck my dick

 **Dallon:** charming

 **Bumble Bee:** Youre The One Who Asked Me To Be Ur Girlfriend

 **Dallon:** interesting use of you’re and ur

 **Bumble Bee:** mgonna fite u. 1v1. pvp me. 360 no scope.

 **Dallon:** lmfao shut up i love you

 **Bumble Bee:** :^)

 

Brendon’s sitting on your bed, watching an episode of Glee that she specifically likes. (She has specific episodes of specific shows that make her feel happy. The prom episode in the third season of glee is one of those episodes. Currently, the episode is to the point where Finn’s crashing the anti-prom party.)

“How’d the competition go?” she asks, brown eyes wide and hopeful.

You sigh, trying to come off as dejected. “We won. First place.”

Brendon’s up and off of the bed and smacking a kiss onto your lips before you even have time to set your trumpet down. (Yes, you play the trumpet in band. It’s lame, but it fills the void.)

“I’m so proud of you,” she’s praising, pressing kisses all over your face. You’re eating the attention up, otherwise you’d probably be trying to shoo her off.

“Thank you, B,” you respond.

“You are _very_ welcome, Dallon.”

You snort but you don’t try to hide the dumb little grin on your face at that. You pull one of Brendon’s usual moves by undressing the second you’re in your room. Okay, not the second, but once you get her to sit back down, you’re pulling your tie off, and unbuttoning your shirt. She makes a comment about a strip tease, and you tense up a little bit. “Not today, please. Kind of, uh… dysphoric.”

“Can I help at all…?”

“Validate me? Make me feel like I’m not faking it?”

“Why would you feel like you’re faking it?” She asks as you’re slipping into sweatpants and a t-shirt.

“I feel like… I dunno. It sounds stupid.”

“I doubt it. You never sound stupid to me.”

“I just--I feel like I have to look like some androgynous flower prince for anyone to take me seriously. I mean, sometimes I _do_ dress like that, but… ugh.” You sigh and frown at nothing as you crawl across your bed to sit against the wall. Brendon turns the volume on your TV down before pressing play again, and then she sits next to you, politely holding your hand. “I have dysphoria just as bad as a binary trans person, and, I mean, I’m good at dealing with it and I’m good at compartmentalizing, but I wish people would take me seriously.”

“Who isn’t taking you seriously? I know Tyler does. Tyler loves you like a brother, and we all know Josh is a big teddy bear. I take you seriously too. I--I love you, man.”

You kiss Brendon on the forehead. “I love you too. Anyways--just--okay, look, we all know I’m one of those cringe lords who uses Tumblr, and I have a pretty decent amount of followers, and when you have upwards of twenty thousand people following you, you’re bound to get some shit, and I’ve been getting a lot of shit lately.”

“I’ll kick some ass, then. That’s stupid that people are doing that. You’re the one who told me that no one else is allowed to define gender for me. Like, I identify as a girl, so I am a girl, even if, at best, I pass for a drag queen. You’re… whatever you are, you’ve never given me a label, and no one else is allowed to tell you otherwise.”

“I don’t like labeling myself, but… Genderfluid comes closest to how I feel, y’know?”

“Yeah.”

“Also, part of why I’m in a pissy mood today is because a few people on the bus ride home were talking about nonbinary genders and shitting all over them, and it hurt because, like, if they knew _I_ was like that, I’d never hear the end of it. You know Spencer? He joined in on it too, and… Like, he’s one of my best friends. One of my _best friends_ doesn’t think I’m valid and it’s so stupid.”

“Yeah, but I’m your _best_ friend, _and_ your girlfriend, so I have the final word. You’re totally valid.” You get a kiss on the cheek, and it makes you melt just a tiny bit.

“You’re really sweet, Bren.”

 

“We should go on a date,” you state, matter of factly, a few weeks after the band competition. You’re in Brendon’s room with her, helping her with homework that was assigned during the few weeks of winter break, when you suggest the idea.

“What sort of date? We haven’t gone on any dates before.”

“I don’t know. I have a little extra money. I was thinking we could, like, go out to dinner. You could dress up all pretty, and I could throw on a suit, and we could be totally disgustingly adorable in a nice restaurant.”

“When were you thinking about having this date?” A pair of eyebrows get raised at you.

“I mean, probably sometime in January, because we’ve got a bunch of holidays and shit, but… I thought it’d be nice. Maybe we could make out in my car, too.” You wink, and she snorts and throws a pencil at you.

“Pig.”

“Isn’t that what guys are supposed to do? Objectify their girlfriends?”

“Well, _yeah,_ probably, but you aren’t a guy, and I am a _lady._ You’ve got to wine and dine me before I make out with you in the back seat of your car. Make me feel important.”

“Well, of course I’d do that. You’re literally, like, god's gift to this earth.”

“Shut up, Dallon.” Brendon reaches over and nudges you in the arm.

“I will never shut up about how amazing you are.”

 

There’s a specific street in downtown Vegas that every queer in fucking Navada tends to frequent, meaning Brendon isn’t getting any dirty looks when she’s walking down said street, looking pretty and like everything you’ve ever wanted in life.

 

“Am I allowed to count this as my first date?” Brendon asks, cheeks tinged red as she pushes her salad around with her fork.

“You’ve been on dates before, B.”

“I know, but, like… I want this one to be the one that counts.”

“Alright then. This is your first date.” You smile as gently as you can.

 

You do end up making out with Brendon in the back seat of your car. You haven’t actually made out with her before, or really even done anything beyond a kiss on the lips, so this is only a slightly odd experience. Actually, it’s not even odd. It’s just new.

“Wait--Dal—” She’s pulling away before either of you can even get comfortable. “What if it escalates?”

“I won’t let it,” you answer, simply. You won’t. Brendon isn’t, like, into that, and her comfort is the priority right now.

“What if, like, our downstairs business decides to pay us a visit?”

“If we get boners then so be it. It happens. I’ve gotten hard while we’ve cuddled before, and what do you do each time?”

“I laugh at you.”

“There you go. This isn’t any different.”

You tuck a lock of her hair behind her ear, and she takes hold of your hand before you can pull it away. She’s giving you this super sweet, super fond look as she says, “You’re like a real life prince charming.”

You’re in a sort of corny mood, so you smile back at her, saying, “Anything for my princess,”  before you plant a tender kiss onto her forehead.

 

You share a history class with Brendon this year. She sits next to you, with Josh on her other side at a table near the back of the room. Brendon felt a little confident on this day in particular, meaning she’s wearing a little make up. In your eyes, she looks like a princess, and it takes everything in you not to hug her, like, every ten seconds.

Unfortunately, that’s not how everyone else sees her. And unfortunately, today, instead of the usual history teacher, there’s a _sub._ The regular history teacher--he’s cool, and you really like him. He’s a good teacher. He kind of reminds you of the teacher from Glee, except he’s not as creepy, and he knows what boundaries are.

Brendon likes to keep a hand on one of your knees whenever you’re on her left side. She doesn’t talk about it, and you don’t ask, because you just figure it’s something she finds comforting. It’s something that started some time in September after she quit football, and started getting bullied by a bunch of the other students.

The grip she has on your knee tightens considerably when the substitute teacher is standing directly in front of the table you, her, and Josh are sharing, saying, “Young man, you need to go clean your face off.”

You look up at the teacher. He’s--he’s ripped, buff, and he has a military haircut. His eyes are cold and calculative behind wire frame glasses, and he has his hands on his hips.

“No he doesn’t,” you say after Brendon’s doesn’t responds for a little over a minute. You cringe from misgendering her, but, hey, she isn’t out. You’re not going to out her.

“Pardon?”

“I said that he doesn’t. We’ve already read over the dress code, and _nowhere_ does it say that he can’t wear make up. Anyways, if he wants to wear makeup, and it makes him feel good about himself, then it’s none of your business. It’s not like he’s in here with his tits out like Jennifer,” you wave your arm in the general direction of a girl, “or with half his ass hanging out of his pants like Stephen,” you point at one of the kids in front of you, “so I, personally, don’t see what the problem is.”

“It’s distracting,” the sub responds bluntly.

“You know what’s distracting?” Josh starts, which is odd, since he rarely speaks up during class. “What’s distracting is you standing here telling my friend that he isn’t allowed to express himself instead of, like, _doing your job,_ and teaching us about history.”

 

You, Brendon, and Josh end up sitting in the principal’s office. Well, not his office, but in the three chairs outside of it. You’re livid, and one of your legs is bouncing up and down. Brendon’s holding one of your hands, and you think that Josh is either asleep or meditating, since his arms are crossed, and his head is tilted up towards the ceiling, eyes closed.

You get called in first, and you end up with a warning. Josh ends up with a warning as well, and then _Brendon’s_ being called in. She’s in there for fifteen minutes, and she’s crying when she’s walking back out. You’re frowning and standing up immediately to hug her, asking, “What’s wrong?”

She shakes her head, and you assume she doesn’t want to talk about it, like, in the middle of the administrative area. Which is totally understandable. And it’s why you end up somehow sneaking out of the school, and cutting class for the rest of the day. You have almost perfect attendance, as does she, so it’ll be fine.

“He said I can’t wear make up. It’s--it’s _improper_ for _boys_ to wear makeup.”

“Well, for one thing, you’re a girl, and for another, that’s bullshit.” You’re frowning as you turn a corner. You’re just going home, to your house, mostly since your parents aren’t home. It’s not like her parents are home either, though, but your house is closest.

“He doesn’t know that, and even if he did, it wouldn’t _do_ anything. Everyone just thinks I’m ‘gay. I don’t _pass.”_

“You don’t have to pass to be a girl. Tyler doesn’t always pass but does that make him any less of a man?”

Brendon mumbles, “No,” quietly. “I just… wearing makeup is one of the only things I can do that makes me feel _good_ about myself, but now I apparently _can’t.”_

“Isn’t your dad a lawyer?”

“You’re barking up the wrong tree. He won’t do anything about this. My mom might, but I don’t know how good they’d listen to a real estate agent going off on them in Hawaiian Pidgin.”

“Couldn’t hurt to try.”

 

You're pretty sure your parents know about you and Brendon being together. You haven't said anything, mostly since she hasn’t been out to anyone that long, and since you aren’t really out in the first place. You figure they know, though, because when your mom wakes you up for a few minutes from a nap, she doesn't question the fact that you’re spooning Brendon, or that you had your face tucked into the space between her shoulder and her neck. She just tells you that she’s going to order Chinese takeout for dinner.

Brendon mumbles, “Why didn’t she say anything?” as soon as the door is shut behind your mother.

“She’s not stupid. She probably knows we’re a thing.”

“A thing?” Brendon’s rolling over to face you.

You nod. “Mhm. A thing.”

“Just a thing?”

“Well… More than a thing. It’s more like you’re my amazing and beautiful girlfriend who I love more than anything.”

“You’re really affectionate when you're sleepy,” Brendon comments with a yawn. “You’re still my prince charming, and you will remain my prince charming for as long as possible.”

“I hope it’s forever.”

Brendon smiles, and kisses your nose. “Me too.”

 

“I want to have sex with you.” Brendon blurts this during a new, weekly tradition of marathoning TV shows on Netflix.

You snort, mostly out of shock, in response to the statement. “I mean… alright. You’re usually so… skittish when it comes to sex. What changed?”

“Not--not a lot, but I just… I want to at least try. Not now, of course, but at some point. Maybe not… full on sex, but… I don’t know. It’s an intimacy thing. Sorry if that was sort of cringy or whatever.”

“It’s not cringe worthy at all.” You reach for the remote to the TV in her room, and you pause the show. “Do you want to talk about it right now?”

“Kind of, yeah. It’s been bugging me for almost a month.” Her face is burning up and part of you wants to laugh, but a bigger part of you has an urge, one that you give in to, to squeeze her shoulder. “Can I just… ask questions, and can you answer me?”

You nod.

“Okay. How do I have sex?”

“I mean… sex is sort of complicated.”

“I meant emotionally or whatever. When I _was_ having sex, it wasn’t consensual, and it was with a cis girl _and_ I wasn’t out. I don’t really _like_ my body and I don’t feel feminine very often, but recently I’ve discovered that I _do_ feel, uh, sexual feelings, towards you at least, whenever my dysphoria isn’t that bad, which isn’t often.”

“Try to come to terms with your body. You can’t change your body in a day. With other people I’ve, like, been with, sex was mostly just… a physical thing. A way to blow off steam. I think if _we_ were to ever do that, though, it’d be more of an emotional thing, and not just a quick fuck.”

She nods. “On the topic of emotional, and backtracking to the intimacy thing, it’s like… Can I get corny?”

You nod this time.

“Okay. Sometimes I want to feel close to you. I mean, I already do, more than you think. You just--you make me feel safe, and--and I love you _so_ much. I just--I think _doing that_ would make me feel all those, like, safe and happy emotions.”

“Well, as far as sex goes, it’s up to you if you want to do that. Like, hit me up whenever you think you’re ready, and we can either talk about it _more_ or get down to business.”

“Alright. I kind of meant _eventually_ I’d like to _try,_ but, uh, y’know, man.” She shrugs, and you lean over to give her a hug.

 

The first time anything even mildly sexual that happens between you and Brendon is about a week after the conversation the two of you had about sex. It’s like clockwork.

The two of you are making out, just like a couple of horny teenagers would. You’re a gentleman--you always keep your hands on either her waist, hips, or thighs, like, low on her thighs, almost at her knees. _She’s_ the one with wandering hands. It’s not like she’s grabbing your dick through your jeans or anything, but she’s kind of a touchy-feely person, and you don’t mind it. You don’t have as many boundaries as she does when it comes to sexual stuff.

There’s a beanbag in her room, and you’re on it, with her in your lap. She pulls away from kissing you, and hides her face in that spot between your shoulder and your neck after a brief moment of eye contact.

You decide to ask her if she’s alright, just in case. She nods, and you manage not to flinch away, since her hair is kind of tickling you.

“Are you sure? You don’t do this unless you’re upset or embarrassed.”

“It’s the second,” she mumbles, quietly. This time it’s her lips that tickle you, but, again, you don’t do anything.

She still doesn’t like her back touched, so you take to running a hand over the back of her head. “Why are you embarrassed?”

Again, she’s mumbling, and saying, “My downstairs business decided to pay us a visit.”

 _Oh._ “Do you want to stop…? We can stop, y’know.”

“That’s the thing. I don’t want to stop.”

“What do you want to do, then?” You’re intentionally keeping your voice soft and as least intimidating as possible.

She shrugs. “I dunno.”

“Do you want me to, like… touch you, or… do you just wanna go back to what we were doing? I mean, I’m totally down for both.”

She sighs and adjusts her position on your lap, and a few minutes pass before she says, “The first one, but if I tell you to stop then stop.”

“Tell me to, uh, slow down if you need,” you’re mumbling as your hands are unbuttoning her jeans. You’re not, like, being rough or anything, of course.

Brendon grabs your wrists after her jeans are unzipped. “Promise me something.”

“Anything.”

“Promise me that doing this isn’t going to change how you view me, or how you treat me.”

“Babe, I love you so much more than you think.” Your hands are on her shoulders, gently pushing her away until she’s able to make eye contact. “I’m assuming you’re placing a lot of trust in me right now, and I’m the last person who would betray that trust, alright? I want you safe and happy, and possibly, like… _satisfied._ ” You make it a point to waggle your eyebrows.

She giggles and blushes and you get kissed. “I’m really lucky to have you.”

You grin back at her. “Likewise.” After that, Brendon goes back to hiding her face in your shoulder, and you find yourself mentally awwing at her when you see _panties._ You do say, “You’re cute,” though.

“How so?” gets said into your neck.

“I have a thing for striped panties.”

Brendon grunts at you and gently, very gently, smacks your chest. “They make me not feel like shit about myself.”

“Don’t be embarrassed.” Your hand, currently, is _very_ high up on her thigh, and you ghost your thumb over the front of her underwear. You hear her exhaling a little sharply.

You gently tug the panties _down_ just a bit, and run the fingers of your other hand through Brendon’s hair. Things progress, and, in your opinion, you give her a pretty kick ass hand job. You end up with bite marks on your shoulder, and small crescent shapes from fingernails digging into one of your biceps. Brendon apologizes profusely after everything is over and done with, and you just shake your head, telling her it’s actually sort of hot.

You’re about to leave the room to… _relieve_ yourself in the bathroom, but she stops you, looking up at you from her cozy little place on the beanbag. “Uh…”

“What?” You frown just a little bit, out of concern.

“Can I like…” She points towards your groin area, then towards her mouth, and _oh._

So, long story short, you end up coaching her through giving a blow job.

 

Once a year, the senior class in your school gets taken on a _field trip_ to a college as some way to inspire everyone to _go_ to college. This year, it’s late in February, and you end up in _Reno._

Everyone is cold and miserable, but apparently it’s mandatory to tour the campus of this stupid college anyways.

Brendon’s sticking close to you, as if you’re her protector or something, and in a way, you suppose that you are. You keep an arm around her shoulders, mostly since she looks as if she’s on the verge of freezing into an actual ice cube.

You also ignore the occasional _look_ you get from other students and, occasionally, some of the teachers.

Come lunch time, everyone gets crammed into a courtyard. You’re sitting against a wall, and Brendon’s in your lap, leeching your warmth, with your coat draped over her shoulders. She complained at first, worried about you being cold, but you brushed her off, because you’re fine.

Josh is on your left side, grumbling about the cold, and Spencer, for whatever reason, decides to ditch his usual crew so he could sit on your right side. You don’t mind either of them, since they’re the reason you aren’t freezing to death right now.

You really hate field trips.

 

“I wanna go home,” Brendon’s mumbling into your shoulder about ten minutes into the bus ride back home. She’s anxious and moderately upset and you get it. You squeeze her hand tighter than you had been.

“That’s where we’re headed, baby girl,” You mumble quietly. You’re tired.

“I meant now. I’m cold and I’m tired and I just want to go to bed.”

You lean forward in your seat a little bit, and slip your coat off, before handing it to Brendon. “I can at least help with the cold problem.”

She tries being subtle about kissing your shoulder as she starts basically using your coat as a blanket.

 

 **Bumble Bee:** i need you to take me home

 **Dallon:** why

 **Bumble Bee:** i was eating breakfast in the cafeteria bc my bus got here super early and someone that i used to be on the football team with thought itd be funny to dump syrup in my hair then someone else dumped one of those stupid plastic cereal bowls on me so now im coveredd in sticky syrup and cereal

 **Dallon:** D: I’m a little late this morning but I’ll take you home as soon as i get to school ok :(

 **Bumble Bee:** hurry pls lol

 

You make sure to drape a towel over the passenger’s seat in your car before you leave your house. Your mom questions you, but you don’t say anything specific. You’ve only missed a few days of school this year, and she doesn’t need to know that you’re about to miss another one.

 

“I don’t know _why_ shitty things keep happening to me. I don’t even fucking know how to get this shit out of my hair.” You're trailing behind Brendon, following her inside, as she says this.

“People are shitty,” you say, trying to be reassuring.

“Can you help me wash my hair?”

“If you want, yeah.”

And that’s how you end up taking a shower with Brendon. You’re in your underwear, and she’s wearing a tanktop and her own underwear. You start by picking cereal out of her hair, and after that, you grab the shower head, and you adjust the temperature until she says it’s good.

“I think you win the award for best boyfriend,” Brendon mumbles as you start working on rinsing her hair out with water. You’re starting at the tips, and you have plans to work your way up, all the way until her hair is clean and free of maple syrup.

“How so?”

“Not everyone’s boyfriend would take the time to wash cereal and maple syrup out of their girlfriend’s hair, let alone take their girlfriend home from school after getting said maple syrup and cereal in her hair.”

“I suppose you have a point. I just want you to be happy, honestly. If making you happy means standing in your shower, in my underwear, washing maple syrup out of your hair, then so be it. I want you to have the world.”

“And to think--you used to hate me.”

“It was a confusing time. Also, hand me that hair conditioner.” You point, and she obeys. You put the shower head back into its place as you squirt a bit of the conditioner onto your hands. Brendon puts the bottle back, and you get started on working it through her hair. “I’m going to beat the shit out of anyone else who tries fucking with your hair. Syrup is a _bitch_ to clean.”

Brendon snorts, and cackles. “You’re the only person who is allowed to touch my hair, honestly. I think out of everything about myself, my hair is what I value most.”

“I get that. I know my hair is short and all, but that’s how I feel about mine.”

“I like your hair. It’s cute.”

“Thank you, B.”

 

Things progress normally for a few months, and almost exactly two weeks after Brendon turns eighteen, there’s a ‘Diversity Prom’ hosted somewhere in downtown Vegas.

“I’ll get made fun of,” Brendon’s saying as Tyler’s getting to work on her makeup.

“Brendon, it’s a prom meant specifically for LGBT youth. You’ll be fine. If anything, people are gonna be making fun of Dallon, since they’re going in a basic ass suit.”

“Eat my ass, Tyler Joseph,” you drawl, quietly, from your spot on the floor in front of Brendon’s bed. “You’re literally wearing the same thing as me.”

“Okay, but, Brendon looks like a fucking goddess, and she’s _your_ date. My date is wearing the same thing as I am, so I won’t look lame in comparison.”

You roll your eyes.

 

The prom itself goes swimmingly. You enjoy yourself, as does Brendon. Brendon’s parents are _conveniently_ not home by the time the two of you get back, and it makes you go red in the face. “Why are you parents like this?” You ask.

Brendon shrugs. She’s in front of the couch in her living room, pulling her heels off, and making a comment about wondering why she wants to be a girl as she rubs her feet. “Mom said, and I quote, “It's not like you’re going to get pregnant.” They've always been like this.”

“You knew they were going to be gone?” You scoff a little bit. You’re a little flustered.

“Dallon, in case you haven’t noticed, I have basically the coolest parents alive. My mom even bought _condoms._ Like, talk about embarrassing.” She rolls her eyes.

Aaand you blush. “Seriously?”

“It’s prom. It’s apparently a teenager thing to fuck on prom night.” Brendon goes quiet after saying this, and, _oh god—_

“Are you trying to hint at something?” You’re seventeen. You’re horny. You’re also oddly optimistic.

She shrugs, eyebrows going up on her forehead. “Possibly. I’m just saying that we’ve done sexual stuff a few times before, and that I’ve been taking some serious time to myself to work through some of my stuff, and that I think that I _might_ be ready and that I was sort of depending on tonight going well because I want to try, like, _y’know._ Only if you want to, of course.”

“I mean, of _course_ I want to.”

“Then let’s do it.”

“Seriously? Like, you’re actually up for that?”

Brendon rolls her eyes, and stands up to walk over to you. Her arms end up thrown over your shoulders, around your neck, and you hands instinctively gravitate to her hips. She kisses you on the lips, nice and sweet. “Yes.”

 

“That wasn’t as scary as I thought it was going to be,” Brendon says this while the two of you are taking a post-sex bath together.

“What did you think it was gonna be like?”

“I thought I was going to hate myself after, and I thought it was going to hurt, like, way more than it actually did.”

“How _are_ you feeling? I haven’t asked yet.”

“Honestly? I feel fine. I think I was making sex out to be such a huge, scary thing, whereas it’s kind of… not. Though, I think a lot of why I’m just _fine_ is because it was with _you,_ and we have an emotional connection and all that jazz, but still. Oh, and we also have to consider that I’m technically a rape victim.”

“True.” You rub one of her shoulders. “So, this isn’t a one time thing?”

“I hope not. It was fun. I mean, I _finally_ get why everyone is obsessed with sex. It’s--it’s fucking great.”

 

Brendon misses the first half of the school day the first Monday of May. She doesn’t say anything about it, and you don’t think to ask _why_ she’s missing school, but it doesn’t matter, because you’re getting barreled into and almost knocked off of your feet from her launching herself at you, hugging you, like, almost violently, during lunch.

“Jesus, Brendon,” you grunt, acting annoyed, even though you’re basically the opposite of that. You hug her back the first chance you get, but she’s shooing you away, and pulling up the sleeve of her t-shirt, leaving you to stare right at her bicep. “What is that?”

She tugs you down to her level so she can whisper, “Estrogen patch,” into your ear, and, okay, you might or might not have gotten an hour long detention for PDA after kissing her out of excitement. (It was a really good kiss.)


End file.
